The Play Australia

      "Adventures in Play Space Design" Series

Topic: Design for deep, open-ended play in the cities with Helle Nebelong

Date: Thursday 22nd January 2026

Time: 7:00pm (DST- Sydney, Melbourne & Canberra)

Recommended for Local Government, Play Space designers and manufacturers, risk assessors and interested community members. 

This series will provide a forum for showcasing the work of our members and a vehicle for improving play space design in Australia. 

Introducing  - Helle Nebelong  

Helle Nebelong is a Danish Landscape Architect MAA, MDL and Master of Public Management, MPM. She runs her own private practice since 2006. Helle is specialized in Health Design and focused on how to improve the city for everyday life for everybody. She is internationally recognized as a key pioneer of the natural playground movement. Some of her best-known public projects in Copenhagen are The Garden of Senses and the Nature Playground in Valbyparken. The latter is Copenhagen’s most popular playground and is referred to as “one of the best-designed playgrounds for children in the world” in the Encyclopedia of Play in Today’s Society by Rodney P. Carlisle (SAGE 2009). Murergaarden's playground – a very small 1000 sqm playground and public pocket park in the center of Copenhagen is referred to as “an icon for natural play” in The Science of Play by Susan G. Solomons (UPNE 2014). In 2023 a huge park - Ilse and Charles Jobson Natural Play Park – designed by Helle was inaugurated in Illinois, USA, the process followed by BBC podcast series In the Studio. 

Helle was employed by the City of Copenhagen (1994-2006). Among others as the team leader of an interdisciplinary team responsible for developing an action plan to improve accessibility in Copenhagen. The Technical and Environmental Administration’s strategy “City for All – Improving the accessibility of the Urban Spaces in Copenhagen” was politically adopted in 2005. Universal Design and sustainability have always been focusing points in Helles work.

Selected papers:

‘Walking with the Senses Open’ in URBAN DESIGN vol. 165 Winter 2023

‘When There’s Nothing but Nature: The Danish Experience with Natural Playscapes’ in BUILT ENVIRONMENT vol. 47 number 2, 2021